The report, “More Fight—Less Fuel,” from the Defense Science Board Task Force on DoD Energy Strategy (February 2008), clearly details the imperative to reduce battlespace fuel demand. The costs of fuel, particularly in the battlefield environment, both in monetary terms and risks posed to personnel, can not be understated. It also explains,
“ . . . during wartime, generators become the largest single fuel consumers on the battlefield. Gensets in Iraq, overwhelmingly used for space-cooling, seem especially amenable to innovative technical solutions for improved fuel and load efficiency.” (page 44, section 4.2.1.2)
Currently, separate diesel generator sets (gensets) with electrically powered environmental control units (ECUs) are used in the battlefield. These gensets require substantial fuel to operate and do not recover any energy, such as heat energy, expended during the operation of the genset. Further, the current gensets do not incorporate any renewable energy sources.
Substantial fuel savings can be realized over the current use of separate diesel generator sets (gensets) with electrically powered environmental control units (ECUs) by the integration of power generation with heating and cooling within a single, stand-alone system.